Woodstock Film Festival entry probes artificial intelligence

WOODSTOCK — Exponential progress is barely noticeable when it first gets started, but are we headed for an arc to the sky in human development that might make the "human" part optional?

DEBORAH MEDENBACH

WOODSTOCK — Exponential progress is barely noticeable when it first gets started, but are we headed for an arc to the sky in human development that might make the "human" part optional?

Futurist/inventor Ray Kurzweil comes to the Woodstock Film Festival this year with his film "The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology," based on his bestselling book of the same title.

"You can have an AI (artificial intelligence robot) that learns the same way a human does. The whole paradigm of the human brain is that it gains a lot of its ability through its interaction with the environment," Kurzweil said.

When you replace body parts and cure chronic diseases with tiny robotic additions, is there a point when you are no longer human? Is it a good idea to extend the average life to 150 years through technological intervention? What about AIs that have no human component and exist independent of service to people? "The Singularity is Near" raises these questions.

The film also breaks down some answers, laying out the current technological trends and philosophical dilemmas facing the mesh of man with machine. Kurzweil describes a singularity point where technology gets ahead of the human ability to manage it.

"It's important for viewers to understand the law of accelerating returns and the exponential growth that goes with it," he said. "There are profound existential dangers that come about, but there are also other issues that are important to the quality of human life."

What would a post-biologically human world look like? A stellar palette of top scientists, thinkers and policy makers, from Alvin Toffler and Richard Clarke to Alan Dershowitz and Bill Joy, present the thrilling possibilities and dangers we face in such a world.